High-voltage power line project delayed, may cost more

A utility developer said it will take more time and likely more money than expected to build a high-voltage power line beneath the Hudson River.

Adam Bosch

A utility developer said it will take more time and likely more money than expected to build a high-voltage power line beneath the Hudson River.

Transmission Developers Inc., the Canadian company behind a 350-mile power line proposal known as the Champlain-Hudson Power Express, said it's now aiming to receive government approval for the project by next summer.

The company had been shooting to get state and federal permits by September, but the review process and a bevy of concerns raised by environment groups, government and other utilities have slowed its progress.

"There's a lot of moving parts in a project this size," said Don Jessome, president of TDI.

In public meetings last year, Jessome stressed that TDI needed to start construction by September to get federal loan guarantees through a stimulus program. With that deadline blown, Jessome said the company will settle for less desirable loans that will force it to pay default insurance and possibly push the price tag higher than the expected $1.9 billion.

The 1,000-megawatt line would deliver electricity to New York City from hydro-power plants in Canada. The plan calls for most of the transmission line to be laid beneath Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.

There's been good news for the project, too.

A committee of the New York State Independent System Operator, the group that oversees the state's electric grid, approved last month a TDI plan to hook into the power network. TDI has also reached consensus on part of the project by meeting once weekly with local governments, environment groups and other utility companies. The so-called "settlement negotiations" between TDI and 27 interested groups are meant to avoid lawsuits once the plan is finalized.

Still, at least two impasses remain. The parties are negotiating where the line should hook into the grid — in Astoria, at the Harlem Rail Yard or Yonkers.

Josh Verleun, a staff attorney at Riverkeeper, said they're also worried about burying the power line through a portion of the Hudson that stretches from Saugerties to northern Rockland County. Environment watchdogs have raised concerns about stirring up pollutants along the riverbed there and disturbing fish spawning grounds.

The parties are expected to submit a joint proposal to New York regulators in June. Public hearings would follow in July.